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Anonymous
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 02, 2002 - 3:35 pm: | 
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The following is gruesome document. Do not read it if you are sensitive to these issues relating to death, mutilation, child abuse and cultic behaviour. This document is a FACTNet alert and a call to arms.
Tuesday, 2 April, 2002, 10:00 GMT 11:00 UK
'I was forced to kill my baby'
Last September a boy's torso was found in the Thames. Police now believe it could have been a "muti" killing, a human sacrifice practiced in southern Africa. Here, as seen in a BBC Two documentary, a mother reflects how she was forced to help kill her own child.
Helen Madide, of the Thohoyandou area in South Africa, was 18-years-old when she became a social pariah.
She was the mother of a toddler named Fulufhuwani and was separated from his father, Naledzani Mabuda, a traditional healer known as a sangoma...
While most of the 70,000 sangomas in South Africa provide herbal remedies for minor ailments, some crave more potent ingredients to practice muti, the Zulu word for medicine.
"He began to tell me stories. His ancestors said that he must kill me and the child so that he can be rich," Helen told Nobody's Child, a BBC documentary on the investigation into the London boy's death.
"He showed me the path and forced me to go along that path. He was pushing me and demanding me to go whether I like it or not. He said he was going to kill the baby first while I see the baby, then secondly he will kill me."
Although Helen tried to escape, Mabuda caught her and forced her to hold Fulufhuwani's legs while he cut the child's throat.
"When the child was dead, he started to cut all those pieces, the hands, the legs and even the sex organs," Helen says.
Limbs from children, primarily the sexual organs, are said to be the most potent. These are sometimes taken from live victims because their screams are thought to enhance the power of the medicines...
Mabuda then locked Helen up with the child's body. But his relatives, fearing for his wife and child, called the police...
Conservative estimates are that at least 300 people have been murdered for their body parts in the past decade in South Africa.
And Dr Anthony Minnar, of the Institute for Human Rights and Criminal Justice in South Africa, fears the toll could be much higher.
"We have children going missing every week from our townships," he says. "The assumption is that those missing children are being put into prostitution and also that they are being used for muti murder."...
But the police have found it difficult to investigate because in such cases, no-one is prepared to come forward.
Similarly in London, little progress has been made on identifying the torso of the boy which was found in the Thames last September - or his killers. Whether or not he was indeed the UK's first recorded victim of a muti killing, the Metropolitan Police are convinced it was ritualistic.
Among the South African experts advising them is Colonel Jonker, who has retired from that country's Occult Crime Unit.
He says: "If there's a guy operating in London, he's going to need body parts again."
.....end of Fair Use educational extract . To Read the full article, go to http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/newsid_1899000/1899609.stm
To voice your opinion:
South African : The Presidency Ministry : Ms Nthabiseng Rantau : nthabiseng@po.gov.za
South African : Tourism Ministry : Head of Ministerial Services : Mr Onkgopotse JJ Tabane : tabane@iafrica.com
South African : Social Development Ministry : Media Liaison Officer : Ms Mbulelo Musi : mbulelo@welspta.pwv.gov.za
South African : Justice & Constitutional Development Ministry : Media Liaison Officer : Mr Paul Setsetse : psetsetse@justice.gov.za
South African : Safety and Security Ministry : Media Liaison Officer : Mr Andre Martin : martina@saps.org.za
Major South African Newspapers:
suntimes@sundaytimes.co.za (Sunday Times)
letters@iol.co.za (Independent Online)
letters@mg.co.za (Mail + Guardian) |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Sunday, April 21, 2002 - 10:53 pm: |
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Slain boy 'was gift to Nigerian sea goddess'
April 17 2002 at 09:27PM
By Sheena Adams
A little boy whose torso was found in London's Thames River may have been sacrificed to a Nigerian sea goddess in a ghastly ritual.
Hardened Scotland Yard detectives investigating the case sat stunned on Wednesday as they listened to a South African expert on ritual killings spell out the grisly details.
A sangoma, Credo Mutwa, told them at the meeting in Johannesburg that the body was probably that of a Nigerian boy who muti killers had tracked for weeks before kidnapping him, taking him to Britain and murdering him. They then severed his head, arms and legs.
Mutwa painted a horrifying picture for the detectives of what is believed to be a West African ritual, involving drinking the boy's blood from his skull.
The detectives are here because South Africa is the only country in the world with a dedicated occult murder squad.
The torso of the five-year-old Afro-Caribbean boy was found in the Thames in September. Police named him "Adam" because they said he deserved an identity. Despite a R750 000 reward, no one has come forward with information.
Using traces of pollen found in Adam's stomach, the police have found that he had not been in London for long before his death.
Mutwa said on Wednesday that the way Adam was dismembered pointed to a ritual called obeh, and signified that "something very big" was being planned by the murderers.
"They sacrificed an innocent child who had not yet reached puberty. They would have drank his blood and used it to wash themselves. The finger joints would have been used as charms and his bones would have been ground into a paste to give them strength."
Mutwa said Adam would have been chosen based on his personality and would have been followed for weeks before being abducted. He also said the crime was not committed by a "poor man". "These monsters must be hanged," Mutwa added.***
Baker said the fact that the killers had not cut off Adam's genitalia signalled that the ritual was not Southern African. "Mutwa said it was not satanic either. The obeh belief worships a sea or water goddess," he said.
Mutwa said he was horrified at the photographs Baker and O'Reilly had shown him.
After visiting Mutwa, the detectives went to the muti market in Faraday Street in the Johannesburg CBD, where they were shocked at the animal remains on sale. ***
http://www.itechnology.co.za/index.php?click_id=24&art_id=ct20020417212733793S353300&set_id=1 |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Sunday, April 21, 2002 - 10:55 pm: |
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Mandela in plea for help over Thames torso murder
By Basildon Peta in Johannesburg and Jason Bennetto
20 April 2002
Nelson Mandela urged his fellow Africans yesterday to help British detectives investigating the murder of a boy whose mutilated body was found in the Thames.
The former South African president made his appeal after a meeting in Johannesburg with two Scotland Yard investigators who suspect the boy was kidnapped in Africa and smuggled to Britain for a ritualistic killing.
Mr Mandela said: "If anywhere, even in the remotest village of our continent, there is a family missing a son of that age who might have disappeared around that time, please contact the police in London directly, or through their local police."---
The boy, who is believed to have been aged five or six, died after his throat was cut. His head and limbs were then cut off and a pair of girl's orange shorts were placed on the torso. The body was discovered near Tower Bridge in east London on 21 September last year. The rest of his body has not been found and he has not been identified. Investigations indicate that he might have arrived in Britain only days before his death.----
Acting on Mr Mutwa's information, the two detectives said they were likely to travel to west Africa to pursue their investigation.
Mr Mandela urged people, especially in Africa, to come forward with any information that could help police. "Early indications ... are that the boy comes from somewhere in Africa," he said. "Establishing the true identity of the boy is crucial for a successful conclusion of the investigation.
"The post-mortem reveals that he died in a very violent manner. His neck had been cut in a very unusual way and he had a lot of loss of blood. What is even more gruesome is that the arms, legs and head had, according to the post-mortem result, been removed in a very skilful manner.---
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/crime/story.jsp?story=286959 |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Friday, May 17, 2002 - 3:30 pm: |
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Man arrested after human head on sale
04 April 2002 07:54
A man was arrested on Wednesday at an abattoir in Krugersdorp on Wednesday, after a man's head was cut off with a knife and offered for sale for R10 000 for muti purposes, West Rand police said.
Police representative Captain Paula Nothnagel said that on Monday morning, the headless body of a 52-year-old man was discovered by his friend at his home near the Millsite Railway Station in Krugersdorp.****
"A trap was set whereby a 23-year-old suspect was arrested after attempting to sell the victim's head for R10 000 for muti purposes."
The 23-year-old suspect will appear in the Krugersdorp Magistrate's Court on Friday, charged with murder. - Sapa
http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.jsp?a=11&o=3363 |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Friday, May 17, 2002 - 3:33 pm: |
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SA police bag 'head' man...
BBC Thu May 16 09:56:00 MDT 2002
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/africa/newsid_1991000/1991406.stm
South African Man Caught Selling a Human Head...
ABCNEWS.com Thu May 16 09:09:00 MDT 2002
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/world/DailyNews/safrica020516.html |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Wednesday, May 29, 2002 - 10:11 am: |
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'Voodoo' deaths probed
By Bruce Wilson in London
29may02
IT started last year when a young man was walking to work across London's Tower Bridge. Looking down into the swift-flowing Thames, he saw what he thought was a beer keg in an orange oilskin.
What he saw on a closer look started an investigation that gets more bizarre as more evidence is uncovered. It was the torso of a male black child wearing orange swimming trunks. His head, arms and legs had been clinically removed.***
Commander Andy Baker, who leads the investigation, was yesterday in The Hague, Holland, for a conference of police from across Europe working on similar cases, after finding Adam's death was one of a chain of ritual child murders linked to African religious practices***
Police say they are looking at similar cases in Germany, Sweden, France, Belgium, Greece, Italy and the US. Known deaths are somewhere between 10 and 20. The first known case was in 1987, Commander Baker said.
Police fear children are being sacrificed with the full knowledge of their parents and their disappearances not reported. An autopsy found Adam, aged five or six, had been well cared for.***
from http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,4409828%255E401,00.html |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Monday, July 08, 2002 - 9:46 pm: |
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Bogus nurse sentenced to 12 years
Posted Wed, 03 Jul 2002
The bogus nurse who kidnapped baby Priscilla Mlambo in Soweto in August last year was sentenced in the Protea Magistrates Court to twelve years' imprisonment, SABC radio news reported on Wednesday.
Magistrate Brian Nemavhidi said Precious Tseko had shown no remorse for her actions.
Tseko kidnapped the baby at a clinic in Soweto and gave her to a sangoma in Brixton, Johannesburg. The sangoma was later acquitted on a charge of kidnapping.
Following the sangoma's arrest last year, a calabash containing a concoction of blood, water and medicine was found in her house. DNA tests revealed no traces of human blood in the concoction, but the child has still not been found.
Sapa http://iafrica.com/news/sa/992041.htm |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Monday, July 15, 2002 - 10:53 pm: |
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Horrific murders in name of ritual medicine
Sun 14 Jul 2002
JANE FLANAGAN IN JOHANNESBURG
YOU ONLY have to pick through the piles of monkey skulls, baboon hands and scaly lizard tails at Johannesburg’s ‘muti’ market to realise the importance of witchcraft throughout Africa.
South Africa is one of the few countries in the world with a police unit dedicated solely to investigating occult crimes.
...While the vast majority of sangomas - traditional healers - refuse to get involved with such a trade, those with enough money can buy remedies made from human body parts, including a cure for strokes made from human hands burned to ash and mixed into a paste.
Blood is said to boost vitality and brains are used to impart political power and business success. Genitals, breasts and placentas are said to ward off infertility and bring good luck, with the genitalia of young boys and virgin girls being especially highly prized as ‘uncontaminated’ by sexual activity, and therefore more potent.
According to conservative estimates, at least 300 people have been murdered for their body parts in the past decade in South Africa alone, but with so few victims’ bodies ever recovered, the full extent of the practice will never be known.
Two years ago the South African government set up a commission of inquiry into witchcraft, violence and ritual murders after a spate of deaths in Soweto, involving the kidnap and murder of young boys aged between one and six.
According to post mortem examination results, the boys were left to bleed to death after having their genitals and thumbs cut off and their eyes gouged out. The commission’s report revealed a grisly catalogue of facts almost too appalling to believe.
In the course of its investigation, the inquiry discovered the common use of human skulls buried in the foundations of new buildings to ensure that the business there thrived; how body parts were buried on farms to secure good harvests, and severed hands built into shop entrances to draw customers.
A probe into the industry in body parts revealed a thriving trade in which a testicle could raise £80, a kidney £200, a heart £400. With brains and genitals selling for up to £4,000, the organs of white men were worth more since whites were more successful in business.
The report concluded that body parts taken from live victims were considered to be more potent because of "the screams of the victims".
During their visit to South Africa, the Scotland Yard detectives spoke to Credo Mutwa, one of the country’s leading sangomas, who identified Adam’s murder as having a west African connection and suggested the killers were followers of ‘obeh’ - a form of witchcraft involving the human sacrifice of a pre-pubescent child.
Dressed in floor-length robes and his head draped in cloth, Mutwa offered the detectives a disturbing interpretation of the boy’s murder. He said the killers would have drunk the boy’s blood shortly after his death, as a tonic to impart strength and vitality using a ‘skullcap’ sliced from the severed head.
"His finger joints would have been used as charms or ground into a paste as part of a ritual in order to give these criminals strength," Mutwa added.
"I think this is a human sacrifice to some sort of water deity carried out by a gang of people strengthening themselves to do some very ugly crimes. They have made this sacrifice because they are filled with fear of what they have done or what they are going to do."
The boy’s neck had been severed from his spine to remove the first vertebra, which is in mythology said to be the bone with which the giant Atlas held up the world. In muti - the Zulu word for medicine - Colonel Rebus Jonkers, who retired recently from investigating South African witchcraft and black-magic crimes, said the Atlas bone "is believed to be the centre of the body, where all nerve and blood vessels meet".
...The word muti, which derives from ‘umu thi’, meaning tree, has become a byword for any traditional medicine, good or bad, practised by sangomas.
According to research, over 80% of the South African population consults a sangoma more than three times a year - after or instead of going to a traditional medical doctor. The sangoma industry is thought to be worth about £200m a year.
...It was reported that the South African national football team used lion fat and hippopotamus grease to enhance players’ performance during the World Cup. One South African newspaper has even used muti to attempt to counter low staff morale and flagging circulation.
...Death threats have also reportedly been made to a health inspector in north London who uncovered what he believes is a muti network bringing children’s amputated limbs into Heathrow airport from Africa. ...
more at http://www.scotlandonsunday.com/index.cfm?id=758272002 |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Wednesday, July 17, 2002 - 1:40 pm: |
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Zimbabwe FA bans 'muti'
Tuesday, 16 July, 2002, 16:32 GMT 17:32 UK
The fear of 'juju' has been pervasive in Zimbabwe
By Steve Vickers in Harare
Zimbabwe's football league is clamping down on superstitious beliefs.
***Teams in the Premier Soccer League have been known to avoid changing rooms and designated stadium entrances, for fear of being put under a 'losing spell' as they walk past.
***"We've been hammering teams with fines all season, and we hope that this competition will discourage them further," said PSL executive member Chris Sambo.
"We have to run the league professionally and instil discipline in our clubs.
"It's time to eradicate this thinking in the minds of administrators and players. We must move on from the medieval days," said Sambo.
***It is common to see teams holding their half-time talk in a corner of the pitch rather than using the visiting team's dressing room, for fear of juju.
The PSL said that teams that refuse to adhere to the new regulations would be heavily sanctioned.
from http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport/hi/english/football/africa/newsid_2132000/2132131.stm |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Wednesday, August 21, 2002 - 4:37 pm: |
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Sangoma 'helped hire hitman'
SHARIKA REGCHAND
A sangoma (traditional healer) and another woman are standing trial at the Pietermaritzburg High Court for allegedly hiring a hitman to kill the woman's taxi rank manager husband in Westgate three years ago.
Accomplice witness Donely Gane Molefe implicated Busisiwe Irene Gumbi (40) and sangoma Nomusa Ntabinzima Mthembu (34) as the people who offered to pay him R5 000 to have Mncamiseni Michael Gumbi killed.
Molefe said he knew Mthembu, from whom he had acquired herbs. During a visit in June 1998 she took him outside and told him she had a problem. "Her friend needed assistance. She wanted her husband to be killed," he said.
Molefe said Gumbi then came outside and told him that when she fell in love with her husband he was a taxi driver. When they married, he bought her a taxi. Now, however, he was making arrangements to marry someone else and had paid lobola for the other woman.
Molefe said he told them he would not commit the murder himself but would get someone else to do it.
He approached Bheki Emmanuel Gasela to do the job. Gasela pleaded guilty to the murder in April this year and was sentenced to 20 years' imprisonment.
Molefe said he took Gasela to meet Gumbi and Mthembu. Gasela said R5 000 was too little and demanded R10 000, which they agreed to pay. The murder did not take place immediately afterwards, Molefe said.
The next year, Molefe and Gasela were talking about having no money and Gasela told him that Gumbi said it was taking too long to kill her husband. Molefe said Gumbi told him her husband left home at 4 am and returned at 7 pm.
The first time they went to kill Mncamiseni Gumbi, his wife told them to come back the next day as there were many people at the house. They returned the next morning, June 1, 1999, at 3.30 am to Westgate where the Gumbis lived and Gasela shot Mncamiseni Gumbi.
Molefe said that before he received any payment, he was arrested in connection with another crime. Gasela told him that Gumbi had paid him R5 000 for the murder and gave Molefe R1 000, which he used towards his bail.
+++Thobile Shelembe (45), who has an honours degree in Social Science and a nursing degree, pleaded guilty to the attempted murder of her husband, Samuel, saying she paid a traditional healer R15 000 to arrange his murder. He was killed during a hijacking in January 2000.
extracted
http://www.witness.co.za/showcontent.asp?id=9051&action=full&catid=6 |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Sunday, September 01, 2002 - 2:06 pm: |
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Muti murder? Another headless body found
August 28 2002 at 11:25AM
By Graeme Hosken
Two Durban primary schoolboys made a gruesome discovery when they stumbled across the headless, blood-soaked body of an Umbumbulu man, but despite an intensive search police were unable to find the man's severed head.
The grisly find was the second of its kind in less than a week in the city. The boys, whose parents refused to allow them to be identified, found the decapitated body of Krishna Govender while walking to school through an open piece of land in the Malukazi area on the South Coast.
The murdered man is believed to have been dragged into dense bushes while waiting in Postum Road, about 250m from his home, for a minibus-taxi to take him to work in Jacobs.
Govender is believed to have been abducted by people who may have known him, and forced into a field where he is thought to have been bound and gagged with masking tape before his neck and head were carefully severed from his body.
The body was found naked in a 2cm-deep pool of blood
Govender's body was found naked in a 2cm-deep pool of blood with his arms stretched out.
On Tuesday night a 15-man task team, made up of detectives from the Isipingo Detective Branch and Durban Murder and Robbery Unit, were piecing together the horrific murder, which has left residents stunned.
Police spokesperson Superintendent Danelia Veldhuizen said the task team was investigating several motives for the murder.
She said they were looking into the possibility that Govender may have been killed for muti purposes.
Sergeant Ryan Charlton from the Durban Search and Rescue Unit and his dog combed the area, but didn't find Govender's head. Investigating officer Inspector Eden Sathseaven said they were hoping residents from the area would come forward with information on the killing.
...In an unrelated incident last Monday, a 35-year-old Cato Crest man hacked off his girlfriend's head with an axe after exploding in a fit of rage.
It is believed that the woman, Sizakele Mzobe, 25, had spurned his advances.
Her head is still missing.
http://www.itechnology.co.za/index.php?click_id=13&art_id=ct20020828112533994D213534&set_id=1 |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Wednesday, September 18, 2002 - 11:51 pm: |
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Man to die for ritual murder
11/09/2002 18:13 - (SA)
Freetown - A Sierra Leonean court sentenced a 70-year-old man to death on Wednesday for the ritual murder of a seven-year-old boy whose heart and other organs were removed.
Ritual killings or human sacrifices to local deities are customary in parts of West Africa, where some people commission killings to obtain body parts for magic spells to gain political power and influence.
"Ritual murder in Sierra Leone is becoming rampant," Judge Olu Ademusu told the court before sentencing Alhaji Bockarie Kallon to death. ...
http://www.news24.com/News24/Africa/West_Africa/0,1113,2-11-998_1255902,00.html |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Thursday, September 19, 2002 - 12:14 am: |
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Njeru Witchdoctor Held for Attempting To Kill 12-Year-Old Child
New Vision (Kampala)
September 14, 2002
Kampala
POLICE in Njeru, Mukono district, are holding a witchdoctor who allegedly attempted to sacrifice a 12-year old girl taken to him by a client for a ritual.
Jonathan Angura reports that Sam Matovu, 25, of Nsenge village where he is also the LC1 chairman, reportedly attempted to sacrifice Joy Nangobi, a primary four pupil of Nakibizzi primary school in Njeru. The officer-in- charge of Njeru police station, Willy Olweny, said the arrest took place on Thursday.
Nangobi was reportedly kidnapped by unknown people as she returned from school. They allegedly took her to Matovu to use her to perform a ritual.
http://allafrica.com/stories/200209161221.html |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Saturday, September 21, 2002 - 2:53 pm: |
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Police lay wreath for Thames torso victim
Sunday, September 22, 2002. Posted: 00:27:10 (AEDT)
British police laid a wreath in London's River Thames on Saturday in memory of a young boy whose headless and limbless torso was pulled from its murky waters exactly one year ago.
+++They believe Adam was the victim of a West African ritual killing and have offered a 50,000 pound ($75,000) reward for information leading to the arrest of his killers.
"It's one of the most gruesome murders that London's ever experienced," said Detective Inspector Will O'Reilly, who is leading the inquiry.
"He was fed a potion or concoction some 24 or 48 hours before his death and was almost prepared for what then happened. He would have been aware of what was going to happen to him," Mr O'Reilly told Reuters after the ceremony.
"This is only the second unsolved child murder in London in 12 years, and there's a great determination to bring the killers to justice."
+++
http://abc.net.au/news/newsitems/s682467.htm |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Tuesday, November 05, 2002 - 12:38 pm: |
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Human flesh 'on sale in London'
Police probe link between African magic and butchered remains of 5-year-old boy
Antony Barnett, Paul Harris and Tony Thompson
Sunday November 3, 2002
The Observer
Detectives hunting the killers behind the 'Torso in the Thames' child murder are investigating the illegal bushmeat trade after allegations that human flesh is being offered for sale in London.
Police believe that the murdered five-year-old, whom they have called Adam, was the victim of a ritualistic killing linked to a West African form of voodoo-like religion. Officers suspect that gangs illegally importing exotic meat, such as chimpanzee and bush rat from West Africa, are involved in trading in substances used in African witchcraft that may include human body parts.
Detectives from Operation Swalcliffe, which is investigating Adam's death, joined a raid on a north London shop last month by environmental health officers after a tip-off that human body parts were being sold. The officers seized two tonnes of unfit meat, including a crocodile head, used in ritualistic dishes to increase sexual stamina in men. They also found rat faeces, which had been removed from rats' intestines and prepared as a delicacy for possible use in a ritual.
The trade in importing bushmeat to Britain has boomed in recent years, but this was the first time evidence has been found linking it to witchcraft ceremonies. While police found no obvious traces of human flesh, packages of unidentifiable meat and ribs wrapped in plastic bags and stored in a backroom have been sent for DNA testing.
Clive Lawrence, Heathrow airport's meat transport director, who was on the raid, is convinced that human flesh is finding its way into the UK as part of the bushmeat. He believes that the trade is also linked to criminal gangs involved in people trafficking and drug smuggling.
'The intelligence we are receiving suggests human flesh is coming into this country," he said. 'We are dealing with some very nasty people.'
Experts believe African witchcraft rituals are on the increase in Britain. Professor Hendrick Scholtz, a South African expert in witchcraft and an adviser on Operation Swalcliffe, said: 'As these communities grow, elements of African culture will be inevitably transported to Britain.'
In the past year police have discovered seven incidences of West Africans conducting religious rituals on the banks of the Thames. They usually involve lighting candles and writing on white sheets that are then thrown them into the water. Early in their investigations, police thought seven half-burnt candles wrapped in a sheet near Battersea Power Station could hold the key to the murder. The name 'Adekoyejo Fola Adoye' was written on the sheet and carved in the candles.
However, detectives found that Adoye lived in New York and his London-based parents had performed a ceremony to celebrate the fact he was not killed in the 11 September terrorist attacks. Nevertheless, the revelation is thought to have surprised police who had been unaware such rituals had been taking place in public in the capital.
The use of human flesh is a taboo subject in many African communities, which stress that traditional culture abhors such acts. Scholtz said it is used when a normal animal sacrifice is considered insufficient. Human flesh is also typically used when a group of people is trying to achieve a common goal.
The possible uses of such body parts is varied: skin from a stomach can be used to cause pain to enemies, while fingernails and toenails are used in poisons. Eyebrows, hair and noses are often used in curses. Particularly strong magic is believed to reside in a person's genitalia. Breasts and genitalia from both sexes are used in love potions.
Police believe that Adam was brought to Britain as a slave and sacrificed in a ritual intended to bring good luck to his killers.
'There is an ongoing search for Adam's head and limbs and there is evidence to suggest a link between those who are involved and the trade in illegal animal parts and meat products,' said a spokesman for Operation Swalcliffe.
Privately, detectives believe Adam's arms, legs and skull have been kept as magical trophies. Two officers are in Nigeria trying to find his parents after DNA testing showed he was born there. They believe his death may be linked to an extreme element from the Yoruba people, a tribe with voodoo-like rituals.
found at...
http://www.observer.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,6903,824972,00.html |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Sunday, November 17, 2002 - 12:57 pm: |
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WITCH DOCTORS ROB OUR SOLDIERS' GRAVES
10:30 - 12 November 2002
Former Gloucestershire soldiers have had their graves desecrated by witch doctors plundering them for bones and treasure in South Africa.
The mass grave of soldiers from the Gloucestershire Regiment who fought in the Boer War, in Ladysmith, northern KwaZulu-Natal, has been turned over twice by grave-robbers.The mass grave of soldiers from the Gloucestershire Regiment who fought in the Boer War, in Ladysmith, northern KwaZulu-Natal, has been turned over twice by grave-robbers.
The memorial was first vandalised by the witch doctors in 1999, as was the mass grave in front of it, and again in April of this year.
---Historian and Boer War expert Brian Kaighin, who lives in the South African city of Durban, helped to rebuild the four-metre granite memorial after it was vandalised for the first time.
---Mr Kaighin said: "The vandalism is suspected to have been carried out by local natives looking for bones from which the Sangoma, or medicine woman would make 'muti', which is the Zulu word for medicine.
---Heritage cultural officer Graeme Smyth said: "The memorial is unfortunately in a very isolated area, on top of a hill, which is impossible to police.
"But the land owner has recently installed a electric fence so that should deter the vandals.
---Did your ancesters fight and die in the Boer War as members of the heroic Gloucestershire Regiment? Contact The Citizen on 01452 420 621 or by e-mail: news@gloscitizen.co.uk.
http://www.thisisgloucestershire.co.uk/displayNode.jsp?nodeId=111001&command=displayContent&sourceNode=111000&contentPK=3025071 |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Sunday, December 22, 2002 - 10:46 am: |
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Cops see through sangoma's 'invisibility' act
December 21 2002 at 08:34PM
By Riot Hlatshwayo
A Limpopo sangoma might be charged for allegedly smearing two murder suspects with goat's blood and performing a magic ritual to "make them invisible" to police.
The youths were on the run at the time after allegedly stabbing Japhta Ndlovu, 30, to death during an argument at a shebeen.
Inspector Ntobeng Phala, a police spokesperson, confirmed that the unnamed sangoma's action could see him facing charges, including one of obstructing justice.
+++ If a prosecution is successful, the case could serve as the cornerstone of widespread criminal charges against traditional healers or spiritualists who "bewitch" people.
+++ Advocate Jan Henning, the senior public prosecutions director, said this week that the case against the Limpopo sangoma appeared to be fairly simple. "He can definitely be charged with aiding and abetting a crime. It is going to be very interesting, however, to see how the courts handle evidence on whether the ritual to make the boys invisible was effective. It could turn out to be a very difficult case."
The boys, aged 14 and 16, will go on trial for murder early next year. Their parents, who may not be named to avoid identifying the minors, allegedly contacted the sangoma after the boys stabbed Ndlovu at a Marowe shebeen, about 40km from Polokwane, last Saturday night after an argument.
The pair fled the scene but were tracked to a local sangoma's practice the next day. The teenagers' parents allegedly took them to the sangoma, who smeared them with a goat's blood, Phala said.
The two teenagers appeared in the Seshego magistrate's court on Tuesday, but were not asked to plead to charges of murder. They were remanded into their parents' custody until the case resumes on February 17. - African Eye News Service
http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=15&art_id=ct20021221203419446S525690&set_id=1 |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Sunday, January 26, 2003 - 8:09 pm: |
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The muti that made the minister invisible
January 22 2003 at 05:39AM
By Anthony Mukwita
Lusaka - Zambia's national museum has asked the police to donate the "invisibility muti" they confiscated from former finance minister Katele Kalumba, who faces theft charges.
A spokesperson said they would be grateful if Kalumba's charms were handed to them so that tourists could see the herbs that made him disappear at will.
Kalumba evaded authorities for months by consulting a medicine man who gave him "muti" to make him invisible.
Kalumba evaded authorities for months by consulting a medicine man
When police eventually caught up with him last week neighbours pointed out that he was hiding under a fern, pretending to be invisible.
Kalumba's name has been on the lips of many Zambians. A common story is one about an empty stool at a bar, which is forever reserved for him.
When someone tries to pull up the empty stool, the guy next to it says: "Hold it. The Honourable Katele Kalumba is already seated here." The reply is: "But I can't see him..."
The retort is: "That's Katele for you."
- Independent Foreign Service
http://www.itechnology.co.za/index.php?click_id=68&art_id=vn20030122053957668C682049&set_id=1 |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Sunday, February 02, 2003 - 8:34 pm: |
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UK Detectives Identify Ritual Murder Victim
A vital breakthrough has been made in the investigation into the murder of a young Nigerian boy in UK whose mutilated body was found in the River Thames.
Ground breaking forensic work has revealed that the boy, who has been named Adam by officers, came from a particular part of south-west Nigeria.
Detectives will travel within the next few weeks to the rural area between Benin City and Ibadan, which is a 100 mile by 50 mile corridor.
The boy, who was between four and seven years old, was discovered in the river near Tower Bridge in September 2001.
When his body was found, it prompted a major police inquiry reaching as far as South Africa.
Police believed the boy may have been subject to a West African-style "muti" ritual killing, commonly associated with South Africa.
After samples taken from Adam's bones showed traces of a particular type of pre-Cambrian rock from West Africa a team from Scotland Yard travelled to Nigeria and took 100 samples from a 10,000 square kilometre area.
They were taken from sources such as soil, rocks, elephants, bush meat, wild game and human post-mortem examinations. By looking for the pre-Cambrian rock similar to those found in Adam, Professor Ken Pye, a forensic geologist, was able to discount 95% of Nigeria and establish where the boy came from.
--- Former South African president Nelson Mandela made an appeal for information which will be translated into Yoruba, the local language, and posters will go up in the area.
--- Further forensic work is also being carried out on a concoction found in Adam's lower gut which he is thought to have swallowed before he was sacrificed.
It is thought to contain quartz, bone, clay pellets and very small samples of rough gold.
Scientists believe they may be able to source where the gold came from and are also trying to identify what species the bones were from.
They already know from pollen samples found in Adam's stomach that he was alive when he got to London.
see http://www.thisdayonline.com/news/20030201news11.html |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Sunday, February 16, 2003 - 8:37 am: |
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Woman mutilated in alleged muti killing
ESHOWE
Posted Mon, 10 Feb 2003
A Zululand woman and her nine-year-old grandson were shot dead in Nkandla, near Eshowe, on Sunday in what appeared to be a muti killing, police said on Monday.
Captain Vusumuzi Mbata said he could not confirm that the murders were related to the muti trade, but body parts had been removed from the woman, which is often the case in muti killings.
The woman's other grandson was injured in the attack.
Melta Sikhakhane (60) and her two grandsons Siyabonga, nine, and Siphesihle Sikhakhane, five, were getting ready for bed about 7.30pm when two men burst into their hut and began shooting wildly at the three people inside, Mbata said.
The woman was shot four times in her back and once in her head, while Siyabonga was shot in the back. Both died as a result of their wounds.
Siphesihle was shot in a wrist, elbow and knee and was taken to Nkandla hospital for treatment.
Neighbours found the woman's body mutilated. The skin on her head, her entire lower jaw and both her ears had been removed.
http://iafrica.com/news/sa/78050.htm |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Sunday, March 02, 2003 - 12:20 pm: |
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Man sells explosives as muti
24/02/2003 20:32
Durban - A Durban herbalist and an employee were arrested on Monday for alleged possession of commercial explosives that they were reportedly selling to members of the public to cure "aches and pains".
The explosive substance that the men were selling as an oral medication, was likely to cause "unstoppable diarrhoea" and possibly death, according to police spokesperson Superintendent Vishnu Naidoo.
Naidoo said members of the police's Organised Crime Unit and metro police, acting on a tip-off, raided the herbalist's shop in central Durban and recovered 10 commercial blasting cartridges and 33 packets containing an explosive substance in the shop.
+++ He said another worrying factor was that the explosives - enough to bring down a 20-storey building - were not stored properly.
Through ageing, the substance could explode on its own from excessive heat or shock and judging by the quantity recovered, the consequences would have been disastrous if it had exploded.
Police also recovered various body parts and hides of endangered animal species, which included animals such as the leopard, the African Rock Python, and crocodile jaws.
+++
http://www.news24.com/News24/South_Africa/News/0,6119,2-7-1442_1324745,00.html |
Elf Kloy
| | Posted on Monday, March 24, 2003 - 8:12 pm: |
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< Abusive rubbish deleted by Administrator > |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Wednesday, April 16, 2003 - 7:22 am: |
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MEXICO Angry villagers in southern Mexico stone to death alleged witch
AP (14.04.2003)/ HRWF Int. (16.04.2003) - Website http://ww.hrwf.net - Email: info@hrwf.net - An angry crowd stoned to death an Indian man accused of practicing witchcraft in a southern Mexico town with a long tradition of religious violence.
The man, Domingo Shilon Shilon, was also hacked with machetes Sunday by the crowd in San Juan Chamula, a majority Catholic township on the outskirts of the colonial city of San Cristobal, 460 miles southeast of Mexico City.
Shilon, 50, was caught by the crowd in a neighborhood known as Rancho Narvaez, state police said. After killing him, the crowd partially burned his body.
Shilon, like most of his alleged attackers, was a Tzotzil Indian, a branch of the Maya. The Chiapas state Justice Department said an investigation was continuing into the killing, but it is often difficult to prosecute such cases, given that witnesses are frequently unwilling to testify.
Since the 1960s, San Juan Chamula has seen numerous killings and confrontations as "traditional" Catholics - who mix pre-Hispanic Indian rights with Roman liturgy - battle to expel evangelical Protestants.
Witchcraft is often blamed for outbreaks of illness or the deaths of children in the impoverished Indian community, where many practice faith healing and some residents - mainly men - engage in so-called "white" magic.
In 1996, residents of another San Juan Chamula neighborhood beat and then hanged a man suspected of causing ailments and misfortune through witchcraft. The villagers killed the man after they went to a cave he frequented and found bottles dressed in the local Indian garb, objects he allegedly used in casting spells on people. |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Wednesday, April 16, 2003 - 7:23 am: |
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INDIA
Bihar: Suspected witch tortured
The Hindu (15.04.2003)/ HRWF Int. (16.04.2004) - Website http://ww.hrwf.net - Email: info@hrwf.net - A 40-year-old woman was beaten mercilessly and forced to consume human excreta after being declared a witch in Purani Chowk area of Samastipur district, police said today.
A group of villagers held one Sita Devi responsible for the death of a local and after removing her clothes beat her up with lathis and later forced her to consume excreta on Sunday, police said.
The attackers alleged the woman with practising witch-craft and held her responsible for the death of Ashok Kumar, who was ill for a long time and had died in a Delhi hospital on Saturday.
The victim has lodged an FIR against six persons of the same locality with Rosera police station of the district in this connection, police said adding raids were being conducted to nab the accused. |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Sunday, April 27, 2003 - 8:19 am: |
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Possible serial muti killer on loose
Posted Wed, 09 Apr 2003
MPUMALANGA
Police in Delmas, Mpumalanga said on Tuesday they were investigating the possibility that a serial muti killer was on the loose in and around the town.
This follows the discovery of a decomposed human head, believed to be that of an elderly man, in a shallow grave on the Delmas-Devon Couwenburg gravel road on Monday.
The discovery is the second of its kind in less than a year.
Last August the headless body of a woman was found about 15 kilometres away from scene of Monday's discovery. The head was never found.
Superintendent Fanie Motubane said on Tuesday the head was neatly cut and was probably partly uncovered by foxes. He said the headless body discovered last year was also cut in a similar manner.
Motubane confirmed police were investigating the possibility that a serial muti killer was operating in the area and warned people to be careful when walking through the veld alone.
The body had not been found by Tuesday afternoon.
Anyone with information was asked to contact police on 013-665-2631.
http://iafrica.com/news/sa/227055.htm |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Sunday, April 27, 2003 - 8:20 am: |
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Muti murder claims 6-yr-old
15/04/2003 18:16 - (SA)
Riot Hlatshwayo
Bushbuckridge - Limpopo police have found the headless and mutilated body of a six-year-old boy after he disappeared from his bed on Monday night.
Fezeka Maphanga's head, arms and genitals had been removed and his remains were dumped in bushes at Marite near Bushbuckridge where they were found at about 09:00 on Tuesday.
"The boy had been sleeping with other four children in a two-roomed house but was missing when everybody woke up on Tuesday morning," said Mopani police spokesperson captain Moatshe Ngoepe.
The boy's parents reported him missing to police and neighbours then helped search for the child, eventually stumbling across his remains.
Police fear the killing is muti related as the arms, the head and the private parts have not been found.
They have yet to make arrests.
http://www.news24.com/News24/South_Africa/News/0%2C,2-7-1442_1348168%2C00.html |
Anonymous
| | Posted on Sunday, May 25, 2003 - 3:21 pm: |
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'Muti man was alive during horror mutilation'
May 22 2003 at 10:32AM
Traditional healer Jim Kgokong Shego had his genitals, his belly button and anus cut out for muti while he was still alive.
A rock was then tied around his waist and he was thrown into a mine shaft filled with water.
This was the evidence in the Pretoria High Court trial on Wednesday of four fellow traditional healers.
Traditional healers Jeremiah Africa Madonsela, 50, Elias Magabane, 55, April Mahlangu, 43, and Simon Leeu Ndala, 52, all pleaded not guilty to murdering Shego at Mountainview in KwaMhlanga, Mpumalanga, on June 7, 2000.
John Msiza, who helped pin down Shego's legs while Madonsela allegedly removed his body parts, testified against the four accused in return for indemnity on Wednesday.
Msiza was an apprentice traditional healer and an assistant of Shego. Msiza said the four accused abducted him at gunpoint on the day of the murder.
They apparently took him to the home of Shego where the latter was shot in the leg and taken to an open veld.
"Madonsela took out a knife and he ordered us to pin Shego's legs wide open." Msiza said two of them held open his legs while two more pinned his shoulders to the ground.
"Madonsela took the knife and cut out the man's testicles. He then cut around his navel and took it out. He also cut around his anus and took that tissue out," Msiza testified.
He said Shego cried and asked them whether they were killing him.
After the human flesh was placed in a plastic bag, Madonsela ordered them to tie a rock around the man's waist.
Shego, who was still breathing, was thrown into a mine shaft filled with water.
Asked by the state what the motive for the killing was, Msiza said it was because Shego's herbal practice did much better than that of his rivals. Shego could "cure Aids" and he saw about 40 patients a day.
He also told the court that "witch doctors" used human flesh for their muti. The flesh had to be removed while the victim was still alive, or else it would not work, Msiza said.
http://ww | |
